Former VP Reveals Heartbreaking Last Moments With Son In New Memoir

By: Mackenzie Wright | November 13, 2017

No matter what political party you prefer, you have to feel former Vice President Joe Biden's pain. The loving father was broken-hearted when his son, Beau, passed away in 2015 of brain cancer. Biden was serving his second term as VPOTUS at the time. In his new memoir, the former VP shares intimate details about those touching final moments he shared with his son.

Biden's memoir is all about Beau. The title is, "Promise Me, Dad: A Year of Hope, Hardship, and Purpose." The grieving father shares what it was like in his son's final months of life.

Beau Biden was only 46 years old when he passed away. The Delaware Army National Guard veteran and attorney was diagnosed with the deadly cancer in 2013 after becoming weak and disoriented one day at work. He was rushed into surgery, had chemotherapy and radiation. Beau seemed relatively stable for a while, but then his condition took a rapid decline. Eventually, the cancer began to spread. His funeral was held on June 6, 2015.

"Jill and I kept reminding each other the doctors had warned us that Beau would get much worse before he got better," Biden wrote in his book. "We kept telling ourselves that these hard times were to be expected, and he would turn the corner. Could be any day now. There was still hope."

Some last moments, described by Biden, are tear-inducing.

"Honey, guess who was at the office today?" Biden told his son as he lay on his hospital bed. "Beau’s eyes were closed, but I could tell he could hear me."

"Elton John was there," Biden continues. "You remember when I used to drive you and [his brother Hunter] to school? That song we would all sing together, the three of us, as loud as we could?"

The song was 'Crocodile Rock'. Biden says he began singing it to Beau quietly.

"The words came back like it was yesterday, but after the first few lines I started to get emotional and wasn’t sure if I could go on," he says. "Beau didn’t open his eyes, but I could see through my own tears that he was smiling. So I gathered myself and kept at it, for as much of the song as I could remember."

Biden says on Beau's last day he could see his son's breathing became very labored. Finally, he stopped. His brother Hunter walked over to kiss him, and placed a hand on Beau's heart. For a second, the machine showed his heart beat again - and then it stopped for good.

Biden doesn't regret spending that time with his son, but he does wish that he had run for president the following year. At the time he was too grief-stricken to think about it, but he thinks if he had gotten through it he could have done a better job than Hillary Clinton at beating Donald Trump.